I’d like to suggest a change to the basic arena rankings. I just returned a few months ago after a long absence and don’t have the historical viewpoint that many of you have and so . . . I post.

It seems to me that the rankings in the basic arena do not accurately represent the skill level of the respective warriors. Also, I would like to reduce the number of quick, one-sided, not very entertaining fights in the arena. So, my suggestion is to:

Increase the recognition gained by “Completely overpowering and opponent” and increase the recognition lost by “Being completely overpowered by an opponent”.

Fighters who are completely overpowering their foe will be rewarded with more recognition. Which makes sense as, even in the real world, fighters who win by dominating their opponent tend to be more recognizable. They will subsequently move up in the rankings faster, more likely to get “Team on the move”, and get to fight (and learn from) more experienced fighters.

Those who are being completely overpowered (which, early on, are typically defensive styles, “unblessed” warriors, and those with fewer Tournament FE) will be allowed a little more development time before having to face the offensive, blessed, or warriors with a high amount of Tournament FE.

I don’t know what the correct amount of recognition should be (perhaps on the order of an additional 5-10 points) or if this would have the desired effect, but I think it’s a step in the right direction and hopefully would be a fairly easy change with little risk of unintended consequences.

There may be a few more dramatic leaps or drops in recognition as people yo-yo from class to class, but I think a little reshuffling could be a good thing.

_________________Senchin
Open Hand (DM-29)

OtisMaster Poster

Joined: Jul 28, 2002
Posts: 235
Location: Florida

Posted:
Mon Dec 21, 2009 6:28 am

I believe you are just restating he current points system. Which replaced the old system of point based strictly on W-L-K. Now the more exciting fighters gain points quicker than the slower defensives.

There is a base minimum for points so that you don't have warrriors sitting in the inits with 40+ fights. I believe it is 3 points for a win, 1 for a loss and 1 or 2 for a kill. So a warrior with a 12-45-0 record cannot drop below 81 points.

Hidden FE from tournies is based on FE. So if you see a guy come in and lose his first fight and gets ranked at 30 points wit han 0-1-0 record than he has 29 FE worth of tournie fights. Someone can correct me on this as I am going off the top of my head here. One of those things I knew at one time but am not so sure of anymore as I have not run into it in a while.

Now I believe some of your frustration is due to matchups. A low end init gettting matched up with a Challenger Init. Unfortunately in the smaller arenas this is going to happen quite a bit. The computer is going to exhaust all the possible matchups before using standins. That is why you need to challenge and not leave it up to random matchups. Pick the fights you want. If you do not want to piss people off, always challenge up or even points wise.

I am sure you have been offered help before but if you need/want more you can PM me or send an email to wbotis@earthlink.net. While not the greatest mananger around I can hold my own and I am sure I can get you going in the right direction.

_________________47-Cheers
103- The Mongoloids, etc

Back one of these years with full stables elsewhere.

SenchinUnchartered Poster

Joined: Sep 22, 2009
Posts: 48
Location: Michigan

Posted:
Mon Dec 21, 2009 9:41 am

Thanks Otis,

You are correct, some of the frustration comes to matchups and I do my best pick my fights, sometimes for advantage and sometimes just for information. I don't mind paying my dues as I learn strategy, heck the fun is figuring out the puzzle, wouldn't be as fulfilling if it was easy.

But, after going through all the posts my concern was/is that the puzzle is unsolvable unless you play the game a certain, narrow way. Either by only utilizing a limited number of styles, only running the very best of rollups and discarding the rest, or obtaining large amounts of tournament FE.

I like to explore ideas that conventional wisdom has discarded searchin for hidden value (Pikers, Whiffles, etc . . .) and that in itself may explain some of the problem. Variety is the spice of life, but after going 5-16 in the last five turns, perhaps I should start conforming to conventional wisdom or accept that my explorations may take more time than I've given to pay off.

I didn't realize that tournament FE was accounted for in minimum arena rankings so that is good to know. I certainly don't want to take away from those who want to follow a more agressive strategy and that's why I thought advancing a dominating warrior more quickly in the rankings might reduce the cost of exploration and ease the learning curve for new players. I understand they do this already, my suggestion was more a matter of the increasing of the rate of advancement than proposing anything new.

So if you've gotten down this far, thanks for listening. I will give it more time, play the way I enjoy the most, and suffer through the initiation period until I finally learn how to make my Whiffle wielding Piker beat anybody's Scimitar wielding AB/LU (that's a joke, nothing I've actually tried - yet!).

_________________Senchin
Open Hand (DM-29)

Street_LegalArchMaster Poster

Joined: Jul 29, 2002
Posts: 3530
Location: The Big D (etroit) area

Posted:
Mon Dec 21, 2009 12:11 pm

I can say I've been playing pretty solidly with at least 1-3 teams for a good 10 years overall and still cannot figure out Pikers,Rippers, and Plungers to a W/L level beyond 40-45% at best so it is definately something that has to come with a fairly large amount of experience and some luck.

I can correct the tourney recognition part for Otis though. If a guy loses his first fight and comes in with, I'll say 31 cause it makes it easier, he has 15 FE from tournies. It's 2 points for every fight experience a warrior has added to it's base minimum recognition. And just for the sake of covering all bases a tourney FE occurs at every odd tourney round. So you get your first FE at round 1, the next at round 3, the next at 5 etc. There is no remainder... if your guy fights 6 one tourney he gets 3 FE (1,3,5) and the 6th fight is just an extra fight where he may have received a few "bonus" skills or train. You then start it all over next tourney and that "extra" fight does not carry over.

You may see guys in the upper ranks who are say 20-10-1 and lose several fights in a row and still go from 81 to 82 to 83 to 84 despite losing. You can generally assume that they have 5 FE from tournies (it's normal base 71, at 20-10-1, the other 10 rec coming from 5 tourney FE). So when you fight it you know it's got 35 FE rather than just 30.

You also may notice when a new team starts they may have warriors who both fight Embexxling Scribe but one gets 15 recognition and the other 17. It's because one either had a marginally increased popularity and the other increased or greatly increased popularity. Or one dominated it and the other beat it but not so convincingly. Overpowering an opponent completely will give you a few extra recognition until a loss brings you back down.

_________________A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government.

Thomas Jefferson

OtisMaster Poster

Joined: Jul 28, 2002
Posts: 235
Location: Florida

Posted:
Mon Dec 21, 2009 12:45 pm

Senchin wrote:

Thanks Otis,

You are correct, some of the frustration comes to matchups and I do my best pick my fights, sometimes for advantage and sometimes just for information. I don't mind paying my dues as I learn strategy, heck the fun is figuring out the puzzle, wouldn't be as fulfilling if it was easy.

I will trade a loss for 4 or 5 skills on an upchallenge any day of he week. Would rather have a win and the skills but I'm not greedy.

But, after going through all the posts my concern was/is that the puzzle is unsolvable unless you play the game a certain, narrow way. Either by only utilizing a limited number of styles, only running the very best of rollups and discarding the rest, or obtaining large amounts of tournament FE.

I like to explore ideas that conventional wisdom has discarded searchin for hidden value (Pikers, Whiffles, etc . . .) and that in itself may explain some of the problem. Variety is the spice of life, but after going 5-16 in the last five turns, perhaps I should start conforming to conventional wisdom or accept that my explorations may take more time than I've given to pay off.

I have gone through different phases of playing the game in the 24 years since I started and there is no wrong way as long as you enjoy it. Right now my focus is basic, it is all that finances will allow at this time. But 3/4 of the stuff I am running would have probably gone straight to the DA if other managers got them. I did the filling up the tourney pipeline and did fairly well for a couple of years. ADM is something I would like to get into eventually but my 50+ graduates will only see action in tournies from time to time to get them some skills for when that day comes. I've got teams with experiments on them that will see the arena some day. Others have already hit the arena with some success while others have been busts. So you are doing it the right way, the way YOU enjoy.

I didn't realize that tournament FE was accounted for in minimum arena rankings so that is good to know. I certainly don't want to take away from those who want to follow a more agressive strategy and that's why I thought advancing a dominating warrior more quickly in the rankings might reduce the cost of exploration and ease the learning curve for new players. I understand they do this already, my suggestion was more a matter of the increasing of the rate of advancement than proposing anything new.

Someday soon you'll have a guy that gets just the right matchups. Next thing you know he is 7-0 (with no tournies) and up in the Chall Adepts or Champs. You know he doesn't belong here and everyone else thinks he's a godling. Where that 7-0 turns into 7-5 and you are just hoping he stays alive. The system evens itself out for the most part. Some people can manipulate it to some degree.

So if you've gotten down this far, thanks for listening. I will give it more time, play the way I enjoy the most, and suffer through the initiation period until I finally learn how to make my Whiffle wielding Piker beat anybody's Scimitar wielding AB/LU (that's a joke, nothing I've actually tried - yet!).

As a joke you are not far off from a theory a friend of mine had about the PS being the style to take down the OH ABs. So you may be on to something.

_________________47-Cheers
103- The Mongoloids, etc

Back one of these years with full stables elsewhere.

The ConsortiumArchMaster Poster

Joined: Nov 23, 2002
Posts: 9408
Location: on the golf course, in the garden, reading, traveling, and now Consulting

Posted:
Mon Dec 21, 2009 12:46 pm

Senchin wrote:

Thanks Otis,

You are correct, some of the frustration comes to matchups and I do my best pick my fights, sometimes for advantage and sometimes just for information. I don't mind paying my dues as I learn strategy, heck the fun is figuring out the puzzle, wouldn't be as fulfilling if it was easy.

But, after going through all the posts my concern was/is that the puzzle is unsolvable unless you play the game a certain, narrow way. Either by only utilizing a limited number of styles, only running the very best of rollups and discarding the rest, or obtaining large amounts of tournament FE.

I like to explore ideas that conventional wisdom has discarded searchin for hidden value (Pikers, Whiffles, etc . . .) and that in itself may explain some of the problem. Variety is the spice of life, but after going 5-16 in the last five turns, perhaps I should start conforming to conventional wisdom or accept that my explorations may take more time than I've given to pay off.

I didn't realize that tournament FE was accounted for in minimum arena rankings so that is good to know. I certainly don't want to take away from those who want to follow a more agressive strategy and that's why I thought advancing a dominating warrior more quickly in the rankings might reduce the cost of exploration and ease the learning curve for new players. I understand they do this already, my suggestion was more a matter of the increasing of the rate of advancement than proposing anything new.

So if you've gotten down this far, thanks for listening. I will give it more time, play the way I enjoy the most, and suffer through the initiation period until I finally learn how to make my Whiffle wielding Piker beat anybody's Scimitar wielding AB/LU (that's a joke, nothing I've actually tried - yet!).

Don't dare think you have to be "conventional' to win fights. You already know you do not have to be conventional to have fun. For over 25 years we have been '"doing some things different" and running "unusual" warriors with "unusual" strategies. It is fun. You can make them win. Keep on plugging until you find the way - your way.